Executive Branch
Just Security’s expert authors provide analysis of the U.S. executive branch related to national security, rights, and the rule of law. Analysis and informational resources focus on the executive branch’s powers and their limits, and the actions of the president, administrative agencies, and federal officials.
4,713 Articles
U.S. Changes Position on Torture Convention–Accepts Ban on Cruelty Applies Abroad
At a session before the UN Committee Against Torture in Geneva this morning, the Obama administration made a significant shift away from the Bush-era interpretation of the Convention…
Avoiding Unnecessary Wars and Preserving Accountability: Principles for an ISIL-Specific AUMF
Earlier today, a group of legal experts–including Rosa Brooks, Sarah Cleveland, Jen Daskal, Walter Dellinger, Harold Koh, and Marty Lederman–released a set of “Principles…
Passing the Senate Gavels
Editors’ Note: The following post is the tenth installment of a new feature, “Monday Reflections,” in which a different Just Security editor will take an in-depth look…
Reauthorize the AUMF: Clever strategies to limit presidential power are constitutional, but unwise
Now that the Midterms elections are in the books, it should be possible to focus once again on an unresolved issue that has generated massive angst on both sides of the political…
The Problem With Legalism in the Surveillance State
Editor’s note: this post is a preview of ideas raised in an upcoming article by the author, Intelligence Legalism and the National Security Agency’s Civil Liberties Gap,…
Harold Koh’s New “Memo to the President” on the Torture Convention
President Obama must soon decide whether to instruct a US delegation, which will appear before a UN body in Geneva next week, whether to equivocate, reject, or accept that the…
A Cult of Rules: The Origins of Legalism in the Surveillance State
Editor’s note: this post is a preview of ideas raised in an upcoming article by the author, Intelligence Legalism and the National Security Agency’s Civil Liberties Gap,…
National Security Politics in the 114th Congress
Last September, I wrote a post exploring whether some of the congressional reactions to the Snowden disclosures might have been portents of a coming political realignment on national…
Due Process and Detention at Guantanamo: Closing the Constitutional Loopholes
The D.C. Circuit recently heard argument in Al Bahlul v. United States, where the defendant has made a series of constitutional challenges to the Guantanamo military commissions. …
Want to Hurt ISIL’s Finances? Go After the People Doing Business With It
In recent months, Western and certain Middle Eastern governments have devoted themselves to attacking the finances of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) as part of…
Gideon’s Army at Guantanamo
Despite enormous logistical and legal hurdles, defense attorneys for high value detainees at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, military prison, say they press on for the judgment of history,…
A Big Week in Afghanistan War Oversight
It has been a busy week for John Sopko, the US-appointed Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR). He and his team just published a number of reports indicating…